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A new draft media law was approved on Jan. 20 by the UAE's Federal National Council, and is now under consideration by the country's rulers. But it ignores online journalism, except for a vague call to create an executive framework to deal with it after the new law is put into effect.

Similarly it fails to address the growing use of social networking and social media sites, a phenomenon that has been little short of meteoric over the past few months. “The new media law doesn't address the e-world at all,” says Alexander McNabb, a Dubai-based PR executive who also runs the Fake Plastic Souks blog. “That is a concern.”

Instead, the new law is more or less exclusively focused on print journalism. Amongst other things it carries fines for “carrying misleading news that harms the national economy” and “publishing material insulting the traditions and values of the UAE.”

“Do they want to kill print journalism only?” quips Mohammed Yousef, head of the UAE Journalists Association, which opposes the current draft of the law. The Association believes the new laws are too vague, and in some ways could place obstacles to proper journalistic practice. Meanwhile stipulations regulating online journalism are conspicuous only by their absence. “We looked at the law and there was not a single word about it,” says Yousef.

This is despite numbers by Internet World Stats that show the UAE as having the highest rate of Internet penetration per capita in the Arab world, with 48.9 percent of the population having access to the web. Disavowing the online world ignores the explosion of web services and social networks like Facebook, Twitter and online Web logs, not to mention the boom in online versions of newspapers and other news reporting sites.

The huge growth in popularity of online social networks is transforming the way we consume media, says McNabb. “I can reach more people online than any newspaper in the Middle East,” he says, calling the change “compelling and speedy.” Blogs and social media also enrich dialogue by turning news dissemination into a two-way street, through user commentary and sharing. And while this raises questions on the validity of news, it can also contribute to the information superhighway. “It was YouTube that had the video of the two people jumping off the Burj,” says McNabb. “It wasn't Gulf News, or The National, or The Kipp Report.”

There would be a problem, however, with working a social phenomenon such as blogging into a framework that governs online media; most bloggers are not journalists. “I think there are really important distinctions,” says McNabb. “To me, a blogger is a participant or a witness.” Yousef agrees. “Personally, I cannot consider a blogger or any Web site owner a journalist,” he says. His efforts with the Journalist’s Association are concerned with protecting fulltime journalists who adhere to the Association’s honor code – a group to which most bloggers do not belong.

Ultimately, though, while there is concern about the lack of consideration afforded the Internet in the draft laws, the introduction of too much regulation is an even greater fear for bloggers and journalists alike. Beyond potentially guarding against practices like libel and copyright infringement, and giving bloggers protection previously afforded to journalists only, regulation could have disturbing consequences. Asked whether he self-censors on his blog, McNabb says he does. “I have so much to lose and so little to gain,” he says, referring to current levels of censorship in the region. He said he'd “feel terribly troubled” if more regulations were introduced. Journalists and bloggers would both decry further erosions of online freedom.

Many in the traditional media are already calling the draft media law “a step backwards,” as Yousef observes. In the case of digital media, though, it doesn’t seem to be making any steps at all.

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